Financial services company Citibank is teaming up with telecoms firm Telstra to offer mobile banking services to its Australian customers.
Citibank customers who subscribe to Telstra’s i-mode technology will be able to bypass the internet and instead conduct banking activities via mobile phones.
Citibank said the new service is designed to capitalize on research results that show 25% of mobile phone users in Australia are likely to pay bills and 24% to transfer funds using their mobile.
People have become very comfortable paying bills online, said Citibank Australia CEO Les Matheson. Paying bills via mobile is a natural and perhaps even more convenient extension and we have created a safe environment in which to do it.
i-mode is available on most mobile handsets including the NEC, Samsung, Panasonic and Sagemand.